Christian Services

Advent Giving Tree: This is a parish endeavor to provide 70+ families (with approximately 300 children) for needs of their children at Christmas. We help people within our parish boundaries, other parishes and Catholic Charities Christmas Store. Many members participate with gifts of clothing, toys or money.

Bus Drivers: Each weekend, volunteer drivers bring parishioners who live in various retirement/assisted living homes to the weekend liturgies. Roland retirement residents must contact the office to schedule a Mass pick-up; residents of Crestwood and Lakeview are brought to Mass on Sundays at 8:30 and 10:30 a.m.; Crestwood, Lakeview and Summit Place residents are brought to the 10:30 a.m. Mass.

Caregivers: These volunteers offer respite care for a few hours a week for someone who is caring for a loved one. This may be staying in home, providing transportation for doctor or therapy visits, or to the grocery store.

Funeral Meals: A luncheon is available by request and served in Damascus after the funeral for a member of a parishioner’s family. Over 150 members provide the food and several members coordinate and serve the lunch.

Sunday Nursery: Volunteers provide childcare for infants and children through age three during the 10:30 a.m. Sunday Mass. Volunteers are scheduled on a rotating basis.

Ministry to the Sick and Shut-Ins: Eucharistic Ministers visit nursing homes, retirement facilities, and homebound individuals. Communion Services are held weekly at the Harrison Retirement Community, Westside Garden Plaza, and Eagle Valley Meadows. A Communion Service or Mass is held two times each month at Lakeview Manor. A Eucharistic Minister visits our homebound members once a week. Greeting cards are sent to those who are ill, to shut-ins on birthdays and to those who have lost a loved one. Follow-up phone calls are made to those released from hospitals. Each month, shut-ins receive a mailing that includes a letter encouraging the reading of Scripture and activities based on the weekly readings for that month.

St.Vincent de Paul: Members of this ministry receive calls for food and gas along with calls for furniture. In addition, food and clothing for transient families and individuals is provided. Food baskets are put together and distributed for Thanksgiving and Christmas as well. Our food pantry is supplied by the generous donations of food by the parishioners, Gleaners Food Bank and Midwest Food Bank. The St. Vincent dePaul warehouse has several volunteers who join together every fifty Saturday. The volunteers service families with furniture and appliance needs on a Saturday morning.

The Beggars for the Poor van is staffed with the coordinator and several volunteers that give sandwiches, hygiene items and clothes to mostly homeless men in the downtown area. This happens every fourth Saturday of the month.

Please see the attachment below for additional information about SVdP.

Shawl Knitting Ministry: Women gather to create shawls and lap blankets for parishioners in need of prayers or support. The shawls are lovingly tended with prayers for the recipient throughout the process. Once a shawl is complete, the entire group prays for the recipient over the shawl. This group also knits and crochets baptismal blankets which are given at the time of baptism. Many, unfamiliar with knitting, joined and with the help of experienced teachers discovered knitting to be a wonderful way to relax.

Substance Addiction Ministry (SAM): Our SAM team provides a safe, confidential place for parishioners to call for help and referral for individuals or families that are afflicted with addiction. Their ministry is to increase awareness of addiction through education to various ministries and groups of people in the parish and in the community. This group also sponsors evenings of education for the parish and the Westside community.

Respect For Life: In keeping with our Catholic Tradition of a consistent ethic of life, from conception to natural death, this ministry identifies opportunities to increase awareness and action in sharing God’s love. We endeavor to focus on issues that are not currently undertaken by other St. Christopher ministries. One of the focuses is in the area of abortion that includes aspects as avoidance, adoption, pregnancy, abortion healing, as well as natural family planning. Other major issues that are addressed by its members are in the areas of war, the death penalty, human trafficking, and nursing home visitation. Efforts continues to be made in exploring a response to additional compassionate life issues that are integral with the consistent ethic of life in our Catholic Tradition.

Our Mission

The mission of Saint Christopher Parish is to participate in Christ's mission of evangelization by witnessing and sharing in the mission of Jesus who calls us to love God with our whole hearts and to love neighbors, even as God loves us.